German conservatives warned their Social Democrat (SPD) partners not to score points in a row over the activities of the BND intelligence agency after an attack on Chancellor Angela Merkel by the SPD chief threatened unity in the coalition.

Global lenders’ negotiations with Greece, which have been moving at a crawl recently, have gained some momentum but remained a long way from the finish line, the IMF’s European head has said.

Eurozone governments would only write-off part of Greece's debt in "extreme circumstances", the head of the European bailout fund, Klaus Regling, has told a German newspaper.

Common supervision of European banks, possibly by the European Central Bank, would help restore confidence and protect the financial system, ECB Governing Council member Panicos Demetriades said yesterday.

The European Commission will propose next month giving the European Central Bank supervision over all of the eurozone’s major banks, German business newspaper Handelsblatt said yesterday, citing Commission sources.

German vice chancellor Philipp Roesler has been criticised for resurrecting the possibility that Greece should leave the eurozone.

CHANCELLOR Angela Merkel returns from a two-week break to the front line of the debt crisis amid a clamour over the conduct of Germany’s president that threatens to damage her own standing and detract from her efforts to defend the euro.

FRENCH President Nicolas Sarkozy threw his weight behind Mario Draghi’s candidacy to head the European Central Bank yesterday, giving a major boost to the Bank of Italy chief’s hopes of succeeding Jean-Claude Trichet.

IRELAND’S stock market reacted favourably to the bond sale with shares closing up 0.6% but Italy’s finance minister said dark clouds are gathering.

Frankfurt: McDonald’s is squeezing out franchise holders in Germany that aren’t willing to expand to meet sales targets, Handelsblatt reported, citing Horst Becker, a Munich-based lawyer who has represented two dozen franchisers.

GERMAN Chancellor Angela Merkel and her rivals scrambled for last-minute votes yesterday before an election that will decide the coalition that must pull Europe’s top economy out of its worst post-war crisis.

The appreciation of the euro against the dollar may have whittled the German central bank’s 2004 profit down to nothing, Handelsblatt newspaper reported.

A German publisher is planning to joint the list of bidders for the Telegraph, according to German press reports.

The German and European economies will suffer if the train bombings in Madrid are linked to the terror network of Al-Qaeda, a leading European economist said today.

German daily Handelsblatt has reported that the world's largest air cargo handler, Deutsche Lufthansa AG's Lufthansa Cargo unit, is to cut its rates.

Siemens says around a quarter of its 100 business activities in the US are posting losses.